perhaps the excellent jobless numbers we got this morning will be the last good one if it's as bad as obama scares us into thinking it is. we know that local and state governments are cutting back. that's not positive. finally, there is this missed quarter evidence. federal express did blow up. it was not a good number. caterpillar is down 12%, retail sales number might not translate into weak earnings. i was prepared for cat sales to be flat, maybe up a little, not down double digits. then we got oracle. while oracle almost always bounces back, making my charitable trust which owns the stock want to buy more, i have to believe the macroenvironment has gotten worse than we thought. oracle is not that bad a company. you don't want to get too negative either. what could be right? while i don't expect a grand bargain in washington, i think that's off the table, it's always possible and if that happens and you're short the market, betting against it or don't have enough stock, you will be left behind. you will be crushed. you short the market, we get a grand bargain, one solution. second, the b